


Not the same as feeling

by DinosaurTheology



Category: Superstore (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angsty Schmoop, Drama & Romance, Eventual Romance, F/M, Love, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Romance, Sad, Unrequited Crush, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 21:55:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12591352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DinosaurTheology/pseuds/DinosaurTheology
Summary: Amy knows she doesn't have any claim on Jonah, but knowing's not the same as feeling.





	Not the same as feeling

**Author's Note:**

> Looks like we're gonna be getting some good, angstful mileage out of these two. I approve!

She doesn't have any claim on him. She knows it, logically, can explain why even imagining that she does is such a terrible idea. Hell, just a few months ago her staking any claim on him would have been a mortal sin. According to some people, her abuela included, she still wouldn't find herself on the side of the angels. She could hear her now, voice crackling like the banana leaves while she wrapped tamales. “Marriage is forever, mija. The bond is until death do you part, and where I come from we're not even so sure about that. The only thing that can really separate those whom God has seen made one flesh is if one ends up in heaven, the other hell. One above, one below.” She'd tap Amy's forehead, then her chin, then kiss her nose.

She knew this all—she fucking knew it. She doesn't have any claim on him, that sweetly obnoxious little hipster douchebag with big, brown eyes and dark, soft hair she'd love to tangle her fingers in. Catholic guilt brought on by literally years of regularly attending Mass, Sunday School and Wednesday night prayer group would never let her forget it, forget that up until so recently (shit, maybe even now) that her laying any claim to him at all would have been a mortal sin. But you know what the pain of it all was, the real pain stuck so tight and deep in her craw that she couldn't even dream of swallowing it?

Lying was a mortal sin, too. She knows it as well as she knows that she can't help but feel like she owns him, some little part of him that she wants to keep all to herself. She finds that she can't stand the thought of Kelly curled under his arm, her fingertips brushing lightly over his skin, Kelly raised up on her tip toes to kiss him--

Kelly in bed with him.

She claps her hand to her mouth as if she'd actually said something out loud. She never would, never could, wouldn't dream of it, couldn't even imagine...

But she could, right? Let's all be really honest, here—lying is a mortal sin, after all. She'd imagined it a time or two, dreamed of it in sweat soaked summer sheets while the store was shut down for rebuilding, let her thoughts wander in the shower while her fingers did the same over soap slick skin until her breath came in short, sharp gasps and the world came crashing down around her while she spun fantasies of his eyes, his lips, his tongue, his tongue, his tongue... 

This was definitely a sin, too, but not a biggie. Maybe just a venial one? She couldn't remember. Confirmation class had been a long time ago, after all, and she'd let her attendance at Mass slip. It probably wasn't a great idea and God knows Emma seemed to need the fear of God scared into her but the weight of so many eyes on her could bear a strong woman to the ground and since everything with Adam had happened in the way it did, well... Amy just didn't feel that strong, anymore, not right now, anyway.

She bumps into her (literally) in the shoe department. Amy is zoning, Kelly stocking the new “Let's Get Pumped!” pumps from Jillian Michaels. They're advertised as “the perfect, ergonomic shoe for toning your thighs, calves and butt” with the manic frenzy that only a Cloud 9 endorsed celebrity fitness gimmick can achieve but Amy sort of secretly doubts that shoes this ugly could do anything than drive away rabid bears and particularly fashionable serial killers.

Kelly grunts a little when the heavier woman thuds into her—the chola buried deep in Amy appreciates a good shoulder check, even an accidental one—but recovers quickly and avoids dropping a box of those truly goofy-ass shoes. “Whew!” she says. “Whew! Sure am glad I've been wearing these things lately.”

Amy raises an eyebrow, utterly unsurprised that Kelly is a devotee of hideous, formal fitness footwear. “Hmm?”

“I think they've made my core a lot stronger. I mean, a couple of weeks ago I'd have gone flying if someone that much bigger had slammed into me.” 

Amy decides to play rough. “Excuse me?”

Her big blue eyes grow even wider than they already are, which seems frankly impossible, as she realizes what she's implied. “Oh. My. Jeez. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean you were fat, or anything, like, pleasingly chubby if anything at all and, you know what? Probably not even that. You're just, like, a little heavier than me is what I meant maybe?”

She finishes in a lame, lilting tone that makes it into a question. She could twist the knife, might even enjoy that, but decides against it and lays a gentle hand on her shoulder. “It's okay. I know what you mean.”

“That's good,” she says. “Really good. You carry it really well, by the way.” She claps a hand over her mouth and the Let's Get Pumped box falls in spite of all the hard work Kelly has done on her admittedly firm and flat stomach. She mumbles something around a mouthful of fingers.

“Er, kinda can't understand you.”

She snaps her hand to her side. “Sorry. Sorry. I did it again, didn't I?”

“Kinda.”

“It's just, I'm always putting my foot in my mouth. I can't help it—I've never been able to help it. It's actually why I wasn't mad at you on Halloween, when we found poor dead Creepy Sal, when everything happened with Jonah's phone.”

Amy frowns. “What do you mean?”

“Well, like I said,” she says. “I'm super nervous when I'm talking to people. I'm always scared I'm just gonna jam my foot right down my own throat. But what you did...” 

She hugs herself tightly. “I was mad at you, at first, like, really mad. But Jonah told me what a good friend you are, how much you cared about him. He said that you must've seen that we liked each other but known how freaking shy or socially maladjusted or whatever we are and set the whole thing up so that we'd break the ice! That's when I realized how absolutely sweet that was and that you must be, like, the best friend ever.”

Amy winces but manages to turn it into a smile. That knife she'd been talking about? Twisted right in her own fucking liver. “Yeah,” she says. “Yeah. That's me. Amy the Matchmaker. Such a busybody, but, you know, anything for my friends. I'm glad you two are hitting it off. Just, uh, just like I intended.”

“Super cool!” She rushes in and gives Amy a brief, surprisingly tight hug that, to her surprise, she finds herself returning with at least a little sincerity. She bends, picks up those awful shoes (they truly, truly are an abomination) and offers them to Kelly. She takes them and offers Amy a quick thumbs up before both women go about their business.

Amy sighs. She doesn't have any claim on him, can't have any claim on him. She knows it, she really does. But knowing something in your head and what your heart feels are entirely different animals, and this one's gonna be gnawing on her gut for a long time.


End file.
